Love, Trust, and the Spaces Between
ping info inspired by cloud uwu comment on this page saying something like "i have slapped the bell" or "please notify me", and i'll message you when i post a new chapter! schedule nonexistent uwu i'll update when i feel like it, posting chapters at a time. i'll probably write more on weekends, though, because of dang school. notes fanfic for fangirl's contest! as of 10/28/19, i have officially dropped out of the contest. however, i will still be using the words because i have plans for them words: *acrimony: bitterness or ill feeling **this literally describes the entire fanfic in like five words. no notes needed here *brusque: abrupt or offhand in speech or manner **scald's personality until oryx changes that *fiasco: a thing that is a complete failure, especially in a ludicrous or humiliating way **how scald first meets oryx: embarrasses himself *infinitesimal: extremely small **"the space between us" *insidious: proceeding in a gradual, subtle way, but with harmful effects **>:) prologue There is no such thing as a completely silent city. During the day, Serpent was constantly surrounded by Scorpion Den merchants hawking their goods loudly to dragons of every tribe, trying to advertise everything from potions to tapestries to pickles. Or the SandWings' newest idea of a sporting event, which usually led to yells and screams and mad stampedes through the streets. Sometimes even a fight broken out on the streets, starting with shoves and ending with blood - most of which were, above all, noisy. But tonight, it was eerily silent - no dragons racing between buildings, no wind howling through the colorful tents. It was so quiet Serpent could hear each and every pebble crunch beneath his talons as he strode through the Scorpion Den. He had never been a fan of crowds, always preferring to stay home alone curled up with a book. Serpent was not your typical Hydra - the familial clan he hailed from was generally quite adventurous and bold, but with his scrawny build and serious-looking spectacles, he looked anything but. The stars above him glittered frostily against a blanket of black as he wound his way through the labyrinthine streets. On his wrist, three bold black lines stretched vertically across his sandy scales: the mark of the Hydras. Usually the striking tattoo would bring a frown to his face - after all, he was a "disgrace" to his bloodline - but tonight, it prompted a smile instead. It reminded him of his newly-wed wife, waiting for him at their home. And the five shining golden eggs lined up neatly in their nest together, almost ready to hatch. Serpent quickened his pace. Through the streets he ran, his talons pattering softly on the ground as he drew closer and closer to his sanctuary. Usually he tried to avoid physical activity, but this was strangely relaxing, soaring through the silent town as free as a bird. Knowing his soon-to-be family lay only a few minutes away. That is, until he was slammed back down to earth. Tackled to the ground. Held there by his neck, struggling for air as the world blurred around him. Unfamiliar voices floated through the air, but already his vision was flecked with black spots and his mind numbing; he couldn't quite tell what they were saying. Then a new sound joined the cacophony, one that was quiet yet somehow rose to the top of all the other noises around him. One that Serpent knew intimately, but made his heart clench to hear at this precise moment. "Let him go." The pressure around his windpipe released, and as Serpent gasped for the cool night air, breathing had never felt so sweet. Slowly the world came back into focus, and he clambered laboriously to his feet. And there stood Xerocole, the love of his life. She glared at Serpent’s attackers, and the sheer force of her anger made them take a step back. He stumbled toward her agonizingly slowly. “Your quest for money has gone too far. I always knew you Halcyons were a bunch of dirty schemers, but I never thought you would stoop to murder.” Their leader, brutally muscled and covered with the Halcyon tattoo, rolled his eyes and spat in the dirt. “We just want control of the market. And you’re the one keeping it from us.” He stepped forward and dug his talons into Serpent’s arm, and he let out a whimper of pain. “He dies - unless you hand over the paperwork.” Xerocole hissed at him. “Let him go, or I’ll execute you myself.” Talons tightened around Serpent’s neck, and he choked for air. “I don’t see that happening any time soon,” the burly dragon drawled. Time slowed down. And Xerocole charged. Suddenly the air was filled with shrieks and cries of pain as Xerocole darted through the melee, kicking and clawing anyone she could reach to get to her husband. Serpent dragged himself out of the crowd, gray clouding his vision. It was easy to ''say ''you were brave, he thought raggedly. But at that moment, the only thing he was thinking about was escape. And that was his biggest mistake. One moment, Xerocole was very much alive, the spirit of battle flickering in her eyes. And the next, she was sprawled on the ground, dark liquid leaking slowly from her neck. Serpent let out a cry of anguish and ran toward her, his desire to flee forgotten. Falling to his knees and feeling desperately for a heart rate and grabbing her talon, all while trying fruitlessly to staunch the bleeding. He wasn’t even aware of the battle stilling behind him; the only thing he could see was her. “Please,” he whispered, tears falling softly onto her sandy scales. “I’m nothing without you.” “Take care of the eggs,” Xerocole murmured, her breath coming in weak puffs. Serpent was hardly able to feel it anymore. “I love you.” And then her eyes went blank and her talon limp, and the life left her body, and with it, Serpent’s everything. Behind them, most of the Halcyons had nervously crept closer, staring at Xerocole with panicked gazes. Yes, they wanted domination of the market to more than a healthy level, but they hadn’t come here to kill. On the other hand, their ringleader’s eyes were glowing. He cracked his knuckles and strode closer to Serpent, while the latter could do nothing but tremble over his fallen love. “Don’t fight back, Hydra. Now, where do you keep the documents? Tell me, and you live.” Somewhere in the depths of his hazy mind, a voice whispered, Give it to him. It would obviously save his life - Halcyons would stoop to low places, but would never break a promise - and he could walk out of this situation unscathed to grieve Xerocole in peace. But if Serpent gave up the information… it would mean giving up a chance for his dragonets to have a happy life as well. They’d grow up in a city ruled by the Halcyons, forever in fear and terrified to live. On the last day of his life, Serpent found his voice. Slowly, he struggled to his feet, his speckled brown wings quivering and his expression resolute. “No,” he whispered. “I won’t let you hurt my family.” The Halcyon gave him a crooked smile, his eyes dancing. In another universe, the two could have been mistaken as allies for how friendly the curve of his mouth seemed, how relaxed his posture was. But here, the amber streetlamp casting a devilish glow and illuminating him from behind, he looked insane. Maybe even deadly. “So be it, then,” he said, stalking even closer to Serpent, until he could feel his hot breath on his snout. He lowered his head and shrunk backward as the buildings spun wildly around him. Xerocole, he thought hopelessly, a final string threading through his mind. I’m sorry. Then a talon slashed across his neck, and his world went dark. chapter 1 Scald’s life was exciting, and he was bored with it. It was odd, he thought, how dissatisfied he felt with his existence itself. Here he was, running his own business as a mechanic, and living on the edge by trying new activities every weekend. In the Scorpion Den, life was especially fast-paced, and he learned something new every day. The noise didn’t bother him at all; in fact, he enjoyed it, the crowded, bustling atmosphere and the idea that every unique dragon had a family to return to (big whoop, since he’d never met his own parents). So why did he feel so… hollow? “How much ya got?” a crackling voice asked, snapping him out of his reverie. Scald jumped, focusing on the scowling merchant in front of him and digging through his pouch for money. He had to stop drifting off so often. “Fifteen,” he replied, mustering as much cheerful energy as he could and jangling the coins in his talons. Maybe his charming smile would somehow win the seller over. “Could I maybe buy two things? A goose and a-” The merchant spat in the dirt. “That’ll only get ya one goose, son.” He turned to his stall and began unhooking a charred, featherless corpse from the posts forming the back. “But geese were only ten coins yesterday!” Scald protested. “Too bad for ya, then,” the merchant croaked, plonking the goose into Scald’s talons and ignoring his hum of protest. “The market does what the market does. Gotta stay in business.” He practically shoved him aside and called loudly, “Next!” Scald shouldered the goose wearily and sighed, ignoring a rumble in his stomach. Prices had been skyrocketing recently, and his small auto shop was struggling to stay afloat. Even with the extra money he made by selling the scrolls he wrote, his coin pouch was painfully light. He knew that he needed a miracle. Soon. A squeal cut through the chaos from behind him, and he turned to see a tiny, tattered-looking MudWing chasing a large coin as it rolled through the crowd and between the claws of commuters. The dragonet lunged after the money as it rolled between Scald’s legs and skidded to a stop in front of him, staring upwards with wide, innocent eyes. She looked taken aback by the towering adult before her, perhaps even anxious, and a wave of guilt washed through Scald for scaring her. Once upon a time, he had been just as innocent as the dragonet before him, talons full of energy and thoughts full of hope. Making friends had meant the world to him, while taxes and poverty were merely distant clouds on the horizon. This dragonet… she deserved the best she could right now, before adulthood descended upon her and she was plunged in over her head. Nevertheless… he eyed the coin hungrily, noting that it would bring his payment up perfectly for another goose. Anything helped his growing debt, and he really was hungry… Robotically, Scald scooped up the coin, not completely aware of what he was doing. The old him would have given it to the dragonet without a second thought, but he had been driven to desperation. He opened his coin pouch, but spotting the young MudWing made him freeze. The look of heartbreak on her face was one Scald associated with losing a loved one, or perhaps being diagnosed with a terminal disease. Certainly not one he expected to see when he took a single coin from a dragonet. Somewhere deep inside him, a voice scoffed at her immaturity, but his bleeding heart made him reach out his talon and offer the coin to her instead. He looked at her, really looked. And beneath the dusty, torn-up exterior, he saw himself. The hopefulness, the purity that he’d had himself so long ago. He saw her discouragement, and how much she truly needed even just that sole coin. They locked eyes, and in the back of Scald’s mind, a small voice piped up about how useless it was to be standing here and wasting time with an urchin straight off the streets. But he couldn’t help himself from returning the pleading eyes, asking the little MudWing if she saw him. How deeply he needed someone to understand him, all the way down to his lonely core. The dragonet reached out tentatively, plucked the coin from Scald’s talons, and scuttled away. “What’s your name?” Scald called after her, but his voice was lost to the tumult of the crowd. Again, he was insignificant, drifting in the endless waves of the ocean that was the universe - no, he couldn’t think about that, he had to focus on the real world. Philosophy had been taking over his life recently, he mused, as he broke into a brisk stride heading toward his shop. Perhaps it was because of how odd he’d been feeling lately, as if he was lost, alone, in need of more in his life… Scald lashed his tail in frustration. He really needed to stop. His world was falling apart beneath his feet, and here he was losing himself in fantasies several times in a day. If he continued like this, there was no way he’d manage to keep his business alive. Again, his thoughts began to run off again, but this time he couldn’t catch himself. Walking through the throngs of energy while fantasizing about what life could be like was strangely euphoric. He felt relaxed for the first time in days, something rare in his mixed-up world. So he didn’t notice when he ran into him. “Hey!” a deep masculine voice bellowed. Scald, shaken, whirled around to find himself encompassed in a huge shadow. He looked up, up, up to see a massive SandWing with the Halcyon tattoo emblazoned on his wrist and a snarl affixed on his face. Scald backed away slowly, his mind unclouding in a sudden burst. “Sorry, sir, didn’t mean to walk into you, I’ll get going now-” His tail, nervously twitching, whacked into a dragon, who stumbled backward into another dragon, who knocked over a barrel, which tumbled into the very stall he’d bought a goose from… and into the flame that the birds were roasting on. Sparks spread to wood, and the barrel erupted in a blaze of heat. Scald could only watch helplessly while the fire hopped from stall to stall as nimbly as if it were alive. “Come on, Hydra,” the Halcyon that Scald had bumped into earlier grunted. “Time to go fix the mess you made.” Scald cast a panicked glance at the inferno now consuming the marketplace. His talons felt like they were rooted to the ground. “It’s- uh- looks like it’s out of control…?” The Halcyon wrapped his wing around Scald - easily, since he was so much larger - and dragged him toward a ragged group of firefighters already forming a bucket brigade. One of them shoved a bucket sloshing with water toward him, and he lobbed it onto the nearest tongue of flame with a mechanic motion. The tiny group continued, filling, tossing, filling, tossing, throughout the morning and into the afternoon. It was a monotonous task, and the ache in Scald’s arms was almost completely dulled by the brainless motions he was going through. Some of them left, some others joined. It was hard to mark, the passing of time, and Scald’s mind fogged with the pain. The pain of the ashy smoke seeping bit by bit into his lungs, the pain of hauling bucket after bucket with his tired arms… but most of all, the pain of knowing that the destroyed marketplace and the screams of citizens echoing through the rubble were his fault. And before he knew it, the sparks of orange were gone, replaced with faded specks of ashy gray floating on the wind, and he could do nothing but gaze upon the mess he had made. All of this, all of this destruction… it was because of him. Because his stupid fantasies had let him waltz into the chest of some unsuspecting citizen, and proceeded to leave him to start a fire that burned down half the Scorpion Den. A question filled his brain. Now what? Torpidly, Scald picked up his satchel - it must have slid off his shoulder or something - and started towards home. Step by step through the shattered ruins of a former town, he breathed in the ashes of his own creation. * * * When Scald opened his eyes the next morning, the first thought that passed through his head was Why aren’t the birds singing? Then it all came back to him. Fire. Ash. ''His ''fault. “What did I do?” he said out loud. Of course, nobody answered. He lived alone, in an empty house that he tried to fill uselessly with his own voice. He sighed, flopping back down on his bed and letting his wings hang off the edges. What to do, what to do? A loud knock sounded on his door, as startling as a crack of thunder rippling across the sky. Scald jumped to his feet and hurriedly shook out his wings. He glanced distastefully at his disheveled self, wishing nobody had to see him like this, but hurried to the door and flung it open. The SandWing on his doorstep cleared his throat and shuffled his feet, the police cap on his head tilting at a precarious angle. “Ahem. Um, all dragons who were at the Scorpion Den yesterday from four o’clock to four-thirty are to come to the marketplace today. This morning. As soon as possible. Government orders.” Scald gulped. “Do I have to? I mean… I kinda have plans already… and stuff?” He had plans to hide in his auto shop and contemplate the meaning of life. The messenger sighed, already on his way to the next house down. “Sorry. No can do, buddy.” He seemed tired and weary, probably from having delivered the news to others already, and Scald felt a strange rush of sympathy. If everybody else had reacted the same way that he did, he knew that he’d be taking it pretty hard. “Sorry to inconvenience you,” he called after the messenger, but he was already gone. Ah, why was he apologizing anyways? It wasn’t like anyone would care. Time ticked by, and before he knew it, he was done washing and getting ready and standing by the door, talon on the knob. He hesitated, frozen on the doorstep - walking out would feel like walking himself to his own graveyard. Except the graveyard was the marketplace that he had single-handedly destroyed by setting the whole thing on fire. He creaked the door open and bounded outside. The neighborhood looked pretty… boring, to say the least. The houses, the yards… everything looked the same as the next. It was hard to believe that just a few hundred yards away, a part of the city was almost completely gone. Scald joined the flurry of dragons heading toward the marketplace, which was growing by the second. As the haze of smoke grew stronger and stronger, Scald glanced around nervously at the dragons surrounding him. What if someone found out that it had been him? What if the merchants fell into poverty from their supplies being destroyed? What if, what if, what if… The crowd arrived in the marketplace, or rather, what was left of the marketplace. The air was choked by soot and ash, and almost all the stalls were either collapsed on the ground or scorched black and brown. A few goods were strewn haphazardly over the ground, but most were just… gone. The merchants probably took their stock with them, Scald thought, but deep down he knew that it was the fire that had taken them. The travelers gathered in a nervous clump near the center of the plaza, most of them surveying their surroundings with an aura of anxiety. Scald noticed the mayor of the Scorpion Den hovering on a hastily constructed platform toward the far end of the plaza The mayor paced toward a microphone, and almost unconsciously, he took a step backwards. He felt as if just a little bit of digging would expose him as the perpetrator of the fire. Glancing back towards the gate, he noted that the crowd was too dense to reach the exit at this point, and a shiver of apprehensiveness traveled down his spine. A high-pitched squeal echoed against the buildings and all eyes turned to the mayor, who hurriedly adjusted the microphone. “Um, hello everyone. Sorry to call you all out this early - and on such short notice - thank you for coming here though.” The mayor started to pace from side to side of the platform, and suddenly the small, awkward dragon was gone. Instead he saw a confident leader caught up in the repercussions of a sudden tragedy, one who was trying to do the best for his town. “As you all know, a fire broke out right in this area yesterday afternoon. Stalls were damaged, goods were destroyed, and many merchants have lost their businesses.” Sweeping his eyes over the crowd grandly, the mayor continued. “Yes, this damage looks severe, but we will rebuild. Working together, I know we can recover from this tragedy. We will not request the perpetrator of the fire to pay expenses, but on the behalf of the city, I request that they announce themselves now. Whoever started this: speak up, please.” Scald felt frozen, paralyzed in one position. He knew common sense would advise him to keep his identity a secret - it wasn’t like the government would be able to find out who he was if he didn’t reveal himself. Not to mention the terrible things that it would to to his social image, and how it’d decrease the trust that his friends had placed in him… His instincts, though, told him otherwise. He had to raise his voice, it was what was right, the thing that’d deliver the most justice. His stupid philosophical side had to go and come set this idea in his head, and now he couldn’t get rid of it. Tuning back in, the first thing he heard the mayor say was “...and if you’d like to leave now, go right ahead.” The crowd started moving toward the street like a herd of grazing cows, with a slow pace and a deliberate step. Scald was carried along, and his efforts to backpedal only resulted in swiveling his head around for a few seconds to watch the mayor talking to his assistants. Alarm began swelling inside his chest, and his talons stilled on the ground. To his surprise, the dragons simply parted around him and kept moving. He swiveled around and began painstakingly thrusting his way back toward the mayor in a daze. Pushing and shoving, Scald finally made it back to the stage. A small audience had gathered to watch him curiously, but its numbers were nowhere near the group that had been there before. “Excuse me?” he called hesitantly, waving his wings. When there was no response, he tried again. “Excuse me! Mr. Mayor! I’d like to talk to you…?” Upon spotting him, the mayor sighed, murmured something to his entourage, and hopped down the stairs. “Yes? How may I help you?” Scald took a deep breath, acutely aware of the gazes burning into his scales. He opened his mouth, but the words seemed to be stuck on his tongue. “I.” No, that wouldn’t do it. He shifted his weight uncomfortably. The mayor seemed to be challenging him with his eyes. “Speak up,” somebody from the crowd shouted impatiently. Scald swallowed hard, wishing he could burrow into a hole and hide for the next century, but he pushed on. And finally, the words came out of his mouth. “It was me,” he said. “The fire was my fault.” poll(s? maybe?) alright, how bad was it? absolutely terrible. my brain is permanently damaged it sucks salvageable. it's okay, at least i'm not traumatized not bad, kid, not bad noiceee, would reread maybe once hecking awesome m8 (if you pick this i swear you are out of your mind) Category:Fanfictions Category:Fanfictions (Incomplete) Category:Genre (Romance) Category:Genre (Tragedy) Category:Content (Stardust the IceWing-RainWing) Category:Fanfictions (Canon)